Poll 2 of 2 Devs are curious.

I just don't see anything that needs a CH rotation being boxed by 3 dudes. Not without external macroing functionality which is banned. Haynar mentioned this too. Playing 3 boxes on level 54 xp mobs can get hectic enough for me. Can you imagine trying to dps and heal effectively on raid targets with 6?
Further, you would need a tank that was already raid geared. Especially if you are boxing. No one is tanking those targets in Bazaar gear. It's a bit of a catch 22.

 

One guy boxes 6 clerics in a CH rot. One guy boxes a MT + 5 epic Mages. You can already take down a lot with these 2 people. Add a 3rd to slow and roll resists on a bard. GG.

 

This.

 

voted to leave alone but wouldn't be overly heartbroken by switching to 2 box. 2 box from day one would have been ideal but can't fix the economy at this point so eh.

 

I used to do 6 for Rumblecrush/doom on one PC with alt-tabbin. Very, very poorly. With a lot of help. (clr/sk/bst/dru/wiz/enc)

2-3+ PCs and you can do some fun boxing with social macros and no automation without too much hair-pulling.

I'd probably only do it when absolutely necessary, but I'm generally not bothered by other people doing it.

Then again I was in TSE for a while with the Zam/Faite Autoheal crew, so I'm probably a bit biased.

6 or Leave it!

I'd say unlimited, but I've seen those crazy PEQ:TGC crews. Automation/macro policing might make that unappealing but I'm sure some would build 5+pc battlestations to a similar effect.

Probably worth revisiting after Luclin or PoP when there's more boxy targets to go around and there's less monopolization for people to worry about. (oh no someone took out the Rhags, doze, and some akheva stuff again..)

 

Lol 6 clerics in a rot is a joke without any automations. Hell 10 clerics would make zero differences just using autohotkey.

Ctr 1 -client 1 press ch macro that will sit you after a pause 100

Count to 3

Ctrl 2 switches to client 2 press ch button

Etc etc

10 mages or 10 wiz? Same thing

Especially in sov where most ch rot are 100 percent unaffected by aoes behind corners or walls.

 

Playing 6 clerics? OMG. Shoot me now.

Now playing 6 mages? I could do that.

 

Someone has to take one for the team =/

 

I already am. Helping develop on this sandbox you play in.

 

You are getting silly now. 5 epic mages for one person? Really? Which guild is going to help someone do that knowing that person will then potentially become competition for their spawns?
You also ignored my point about gear. Either these people have already geared their 18 toons with gear you can sit under AE's with, or they are starting from scratch.
Starting from scratch will take months in which case the guilds have moved on so who cares?
Already geared means they are in guilds so they aren't going to shoot themselves in the foot by killing their own guild's targets. They won't remain tagged for long.
The discussion is largely academic anyway. Anything 3x6 could do, 6x3 can do today. The fact that a small group isn't locking down the raid targets today proves its a non issue.
You have a preference for 2 or no boxing, that's great. However, there's no good reason for that apart from it being your preference.

 

It doesn't take months to have gear to take on Kael, Dain, ToV and other high end Velious target, more like weeks. And unless the devs are pushing out expansions or new content every couple of months, no, other guilds are not moving on to anything in that timeframe.

It is not unreasonable at all for a small group of 3-6 people to collectively pool resources across their characters and focus roles (heals, debuffs, dps, tanking) via 6-boxing during a raid. If you think it would be impossible to do this, no offense but you are just wrong. Two people can do a 12-man CH rot no problem. One person can play 6+ wizards/mages no problem. Especially for fights with no AE or where you can avoid the AE. The guy playing 6 epic mages on your raid night doesn't mean he is playing 6 epic mages day in and day out on off-nights.

Part of the fun of this game is working to do tough things with a lot of different players. If everyone can do endgame content with 6+ boxes in non-instanced raid targets, it takes away from other people's enjoyment of the game. Unless you are hardcore and want to compete against other people in that way, but I feel like that is not the direction most folks on this server want it to go.

In Luclin/PoP this doesn't mean as much because it's harder to 6+ box due to split tanking and other mechanics that come into play during raid events.

 

Where does this mythical person get 5 or 6 epic mages?

The question was, if we increase the box limit to 6 would raid content suddenly be monopolised by poopsocking 6 boxers? That being the only reason (apart from personal preference) to prevent increasing the limit. If these people exist they would already be monopolising the content as 6 x 3 boxers if it is all as easy as everyone is making it out to be.

It's all academic as people clearly prefer to stick with 3 box limit but I just don't buy the 'for the good of the game' argument. Hence the post storm. I reckon I better shut up now ...

 

There is already a guild killing in ntov and kael with 7x3 and being pretty vocal about it.

Increase the limit and you will
Have a rotation of 10+ guilds within a month.

 

Mages don't need an epic to do good damage, or any gear really. Same for wizards. And getting gear is not hard anyways with a focused group of 3-4 folks that can dedicate time to play together.

I don't mean to stir up drama or anything, just stating a fact, a guild on this server has already killed an endgame Velious raid mob with 7 players, and that is obviously with the current 3-box policy. I don't see this issue as academic since there is dev poll and on-going discussion...

 

The problem is that boxing almost always improves production, all other things being equal. 10 people 6 boxing will beat 10 people 3 boxing any day. Just imagine adding an AFK bard for every group and pick the song per encounter. Or play two clerics instead of one, and switch when the first runs OOM.

Also, I think some people have gotten mentally stuck on the epic mage thing. The L60 water pet probably does nearly as much damage for raids with the backstab and the focus item is very easy to obtain. Just mentally delete the epic part and gearing up a few mages and clerics is really not bad.

Edit: looks like Jizmak beat me to it!

 

lol unlimited you just asking for players to figure out how to run macroquest on this server. I am a cheater so i will figure it out or pay someone to make me one that will work here. This is takp not peq tgc or EQTitan i would just say leave it alone 3 box and make some friends or i will have to change they theme song to Denis leary ~ Asshole

The more you take away interdependency the more people will be ASSHOLES !!!!

 

Cool. An actual data point and I am proved wrong. Excellent.
Is this a big deal, really? It's just competition for spawns in a non-instanced game. If a crew of boxers can mobilize and move their boxes to a target faster than a guild can then power to them surely? What's the minimum number of humans for it to be a 'real kill'? Should the mobs just stay up until the guilds are ready to kill them?
Not trying to be an arse but isn't this how it has always been with Everquest?
Point taken about mages btw but I didn't raise the 5 epic mage thing

 

I

Do you have level 60 toons that currently raid? Increasing the box limit to six would make it very easy for a handful of people to down most of the raid targets currently under rotation. Dain, KT, Yelinak, Zlandicar, CT, etc could be done by 4 actual people playing the right class composition. Many folks already have more than 3 geared toons. It would be easy to have one guy play a bard (singing mana song) and 5 clerics in a c heal rotation. Another 2 guys could easily box 6 wizards or mages for DPS each. Add another boxing a tanks and support classes.
M

 

6 epic mages. Thats at least 150k plat to Bum. Sure. I got 2k plat total. All over that idea. I am in!!!!

 

Have you tried to kill Naggy/Vox recently? The person who keeps them (mostly) locked down has 3 lvl 52 epic Mages. If the cap is raised to 6, you don't think there would be other people like him on bigger/current/rotation targets? It's not that difficult to get epics if you are willing to put in the time. Especially with 18 characters.

Your arguments so far have been, "well I can't 6 box on raids, so nobody can," to "I can't get 5 Mage epics, so nobody can," and the overarching argument, "I don't care about the raid scene, so who cares?" Well, some people do care. It's the reason we play.

As to the "isn't this how Everquest has always been" argument, did you play in 2000? Did you raid? How many people in your guild were 6 boxing? Most people's computers and ISPs limited their ability to play more than 2. Heck, many playing 1 had to stare at walls in ToV to not lag out. This content was not designed for people 6 boxing. This is not a current video game. It's an emulation of an 18 year old game.

 

We have a rotation for raid targets here.

More boxes means longer and more diluted rotation for everyone.

This kind of playstyle also completely misses the point of a server like this.

AK was never about boxing as much as possible or competition (lol competition on 19 year old pixels).

Wanna know what is hard about eq? It isn't 4 manning raid target with tons of boxes, that's easy in this slow paced expansion and game.

Making a guild with people of all kinds and trying to know rhem all, care about them and ultimately share end game experiences and adventures with them because you give a damn.

That is hard.

Trying to keep everyone busy and happy and willing to come back, settle differences between johny hardcore and lucy the soccer mom who doesnt play as well.
Teach people things about eq without being condescending. Earning respect from others abd trusting them in return.

All those things are 10 times harder than having a guild of 4 powergamers. It's also a lot more fun because you will learn and laugh and meet tons of people with stories.

This server is already fragmented as it is due to 3 boxing. Imo it is now too late to lower this limit, i would rather we don't increase it so as to not fragment to community even further.

 

Now you are moving the goal posts. Your first question was:

I think the answer to this would be a resounding "yes" and it seems lot of folks share this opinion. Now you are changing the debate to:

So... yes, it is a big deal?

Edit: post came off more smarmy than I cared for. Addressing these points as well:

The raiding guilds on the server have agreed to a rotation, so yes the mobs stay up until the guild is ready to kill them. If we go to FFA, I would probably not play on this server anymore. I'm not about that life.

 

At this point. Only one thing would forcibly lower the boxing limit. Thats population. If population grows to where the server cannot function? Something may need done. Like adding a login queue. Or limiting boxing. But we are far from that point.

 

If we get enough people that we have this issue i will happily clap at the move to 2 box limit.

 

2box limit over queue any day of the week IMO.

 

Then why are we even having this discussion? This server is great. You guys have done an amazing job. More people want to come and play here every day. But not everyone that plays games does so ethically. This can't come as a shock to you guys. You're all smart and have been around gaming communities for a very long time. Surely, there's an easier solution than scrapping what has worked and going with an entirely new model.

 

Did not know that. However, my previous argument still applies. Someone helped them to do that knowing that they could then lock down a target.

Nice try at putting words in my mouth. I said none of these things.

Yes, and yes. However, when the likes of FOH were happy to admit that quite a few of their world firsts had boxes involved then I don't think it was as rare as you are trying to pretend.
I did not know there was a rotation and not FFA. Thus, my points regarding FFA don't apply. Happy to be proven wrong here.

 

I really don't mean to be a jerk but you should re-read your posts because a lot of us are apparently mis-reading or mis-understanding your words in the same way. e.g. :

I'm pushing the eject button on this one. Godspeed!

 

I will echo what others said. If we ever get to the point where server population is too high, I think lowering the box limit from 3 to 2 is the best way to solve that. It is certainly better than a login queue.

The developers are doing an amazing job here. I have contributed to the fund as I appreciate all the efforts. Going forward, I am not sure if it makes sense to have too many of these open polls with free-flowing discussion. People get up in arms. And the folks that like the server as is (like me) start to have 2nd doubts about the stability of the server.